ARTICLE 29 - DATA PROTECTION WORKING PARTY ON THE PROTECTION OF INDIVIDUALS WITH REGARD TO THE PROCESSING OF PERSONAL DATA Opinion on the application of the data protection principles to the WhoIs Directories (ORIGINAL DOCUMENT AS .PDF) 1. Introduction: The WhoIs directories raise several issues from the data protection perspective. WhoIs data relates to those [...]
On 2 March 2007 the US Copyright Royalty Board (a 3-judge panel) sided with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and against Web-casters, musicians and consumers with a ruling on the new web-casting royalty rate. The CRB took the highly controversial position of adopting a pay-per-play rate for streaming digital music instead of the current percentage of revenue model. Web-casters report that the fee hike will put them entirely out of business and kill Internet radio since it amounts to more than 100% of their revenues.
Civil Society Proposes Amendment to Protect Civil Liberties and Innovation ICANN’s Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) submitted a proposal to protect freedom of expression and innovation in the introduction of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs). ICANN’s policy council, the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), is currently developing policy recommendations to regulate the introduction of new top-level domain names on the Internet. NCUC is troubled by the GNSO’s draft recommendation to create string selection criteria that would prevent the registration of a new gTLD string that contains a controversial word or idea. ..."
"... Unless reformed, this ICANN policy will prevent anyone in the world from being able to use controversial words like "abortion" or "gay" in a new gTLD if a single country objects to their use. The proposal would further prevent the use of numerous ordinary words like "herb" and "john" in a string since they can have an illegal connotation in certain contexts. In addition to any country in the world being able to stop a new gTLD string, ICANN staff would also be able to prevent any idea that it deemed too controversial to exist in the new domain space. The 13 Feb. proposal (Term of Reference 2(x)) gives ICANN staff the important job of making preliminary determinations as to whether a string is inappropriate and who the "legitimate sponsor" of a domain name (such as .god) should be. "The 13 Feb proposal would essentially make ICANN the arbiter of public policy and morality in the new gTLD space, a frightening prospect for anyone who cares about democracy and free expression," said Robin Gross, Executive Director of IP Justice, an NCUC member organization. "The proposal would give ICANN enormous power to regulate the use of language on the Internet and lead to massive censorship of controversial ideas." ...
Little case law exists in the United States that specifically deals with a consumer’s legal rights to use Karaoke CD+Graphic (CDG) discs. The lack of case law in this area leads to uncertainty among consumers regarding the legality of different uses of a CDG disc. This legal uncertainty has also lead to intimidation and fear of lawsuits stemming from over-zealous threats from karaoke producers, music publishers or record companies who hope to extend their rights in an unchartered area. Private consumers, karaoke hosting businesses (KJs), bars, restaurants, and others all make use of CDG discs in different ways and for different purposes. As a result, their legal rights may vary in some situations. ...
"Current proposal is unworkable due to competing standards of morality and competing public policy objectives. Current proposal usurps national sovereignty. ICANN is not a legislative body to be determining "appropriate" public policy objectives and global standards of morality. National legislatures determine what is lawful in their own jurisdictions. Current proposal places enormous burden and liability on ICANN for its decisions as to what is controversial and who is the worthy applicant for a particular string. ICANN will have to remain content-neutral to avoid legal liability. Freedom of expression can be better protected with NCUC's proposal since the restrictions are more narrowly tailored to meet national law...."
... Intellectual property rights can foster economic and social development. The Broadcast Treaty in its current form will not help to reach these aims and does not, in our understanding, comply with the decision of the 2006 General Assembly.
The undersigned organisations represent a broad set of constituencies with a direct interest in the discussions underway regarding an international instrument relating to broadcasting. Whilst we remain unconvinced that a treaty is necessary at all – and note that no convincing evidence has been presented that new international norms are required in this area – we do believe that a focussed, signal-protection-based Instrument to prevent piracy could be valuable. ...
The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) appreciates the efforts of the U.S. Delegation to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to advance a signal-theft-based approach in the negotiations on the WIPO Treaty on the Protection of Broadcasts and Broadcasting Organizations, and urges you to continue to work to ensure that any WIPO broadcasting treaty does not impede the ability of the world’s consumers to benefit from developments in home and personal network technologies. ....
The undersigned public interest organizations wish to request a public and recordable meeting with the US delegation to WIPO before the Special Session of the World Intellectual Property Organization's Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR), First Session January 17, 2007 to January 19, 2007 (Geneva, Switzerland). The undersigned respectfully request that the USPTO or/and the Library of Congress (LOC) invite formal public comments on the proposal to create a new International Treaty obligation establishing a novel intellectual property regime for broadcasting and cablecasting organizations, through the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). We believe it is important to have public comments on the impact on U.S. law and affected constituencies if the U.S. or any other country were to ratify a new WIPO Treaty embodying that proposal.